LITTLE ROCK — GOP congressman Steve Womack is drumming up support for a law that would allow states to levy sales tax on online and catalog purchases.

Womack wrote in a column published Monday on his website that online retailers enjoy "a 10 percent price advantage" over brick-and-mortar stores that collect and remit state sales tax, adding "small retailers have become little more than a 'showroom' for their online counterparts."

A Dec. 5 event is planned in Washington to rally support for the so-called Marketplace Fairness Act, which is backed by the National Conference of State Legislatures. Womack is scheduled to speak along with Sen. Mike Enzi of Wyoming, Sen. Dick Durbin of Illinois, Rep. Jackie Speier of California and Rep. Peter Welch of Vermont. All five are sponsors of the bill, which would allow states to require online and catalog retailers to collect and pay sales taxes.

The NCSL says states are expected to lose more than $23 billion in taxes this year on Internet and catalog sales as opposed to taxes collected by brick-and-mortar businesses.

"Ninety-seven percent of Arkansas employers are small businesses. These firms are the foundation on which our state's economy is built,” said Smith Sylvester Smith III, the state's director of the National Federation of Independent Business, in a statement released on Small Business Saturday, which comes the day after Black Friday.

In Arkansas and other states with sales tax, individuals are required to pay “sales and use” tax on out-of-state purchases but a small fraction actually comply, the Arkansas News Bureau reported in July. The Arkansas Department of Finance and Administration has a downloadable one-page form to be completed for sales tax to be remitted for online purchases.

The Associated Press and Arkansas News Bureau contributed information to this report.